Should the alcohol industry be required to pay for the negative consequences of it being legal? Should we do something for the businesses near the New Hampshire border? What about other drugs, like marijuana? Legal with taxes to provide addiction treatment? What about gambling?

Their point of view is…

Alcohol is not a necessity and does not deserve a special tax exemption. The only goods in Massachusetts exempt from the sales tax are necessities like food, clothing, and prescriptions. If anything should be taxed, products like cigarettes and alcohol should be.

Revenues from the alcohol tax provide dedicated funding for healthcare services for more than 100,000 residents with behavioral health problems. Massachusetts has some of the highest rates of alcohol and drug abuse in the country – the last thing we need is to take money away from prevention and treatment services to make alcohol more accessible. The alcohol tax literally saves lives by reducing teen drinking and funding treatment services to help people beat addictions and getting their lives back on track.

Nearly every other state has a sales tax on alcohol. With Massachusetts facing a serious budget deficit, don’t give alcohol a special exemption.

This means that any tax cuts for new investment may hardly be used. Businesses aren’t suddenly going to invest more money, when they are more concerned about their own balance sheets and those of potential consumers of their goods. And even if they do, their spending is liable to be more of a “cash for clunkers” scenario than something that can help the real economy.

The same goes for any proposed maintenance of the Bush Tax cuts, which would just be pocketed or used to pay down debts on underwater mortgages by consumers. And, in some cases, those who may even be in good financial shape may elect to save money as their confidence is so low in the future of the economy.

9/11: how does the memory of 9/11 compare to other tragic moments in history? pearl harbor, JFK, Martin Luther King… do any other moments have the same resonance?

Book burning: is burning the Koran the same as cartoons of Mohammed? Why not? Why didn’t we have the same outcry for the cartoons? In fact, there were Facebook groups and movements for people to make more cartoons. What’s the difference?

Democracy in action: Tony Schinella, editor of Politizine.com, moderated the debate between Barney Frank and Rachel Scott. Amazing he agreed to it. Amazing to listen to it. Tony tells us how it went.